Honest Players are as Necessary as Honest Umpires
NO TEAM has had to tour Pakistan for a series of Test matches in hotter conditions than Allan Border's Australian cricketers do. When they took the field on the second day of their opening match against the Patron's XI at the Qadafi Stadium on Tuesday, the temperature soared to 40 degrees centigrade in the shade by the afternoon. And on the first day, their opening batsman, especially Marsh and Boon gave their side a start of 138 before Boon was out. These two must be the most consistent opening pair in the world right now. Generally, the two score together but if they don't, at least one of them comes good. They were a major factor in Australia 's World Cup triumph last year.
With Imran Khan out and Wasim Akram on the sick list, Pakistan will be hard pressed getting the Australian openers out and with Wood, Border, Valetta and the rest to follow, one doesn't see how the Australians can be got out twice in the same match unless, of course, the wickets are tailor-made for Abdul Qadir . Even then, without Imran Khan and Wasim Akram's striking ability, Qadir will be half the weapon he has hitherto been. You don't put the spinners on until the opposition has been softened up by a blistering pace attack.
All in all, then, Australia must be regarded as the favourites both in the Test series proper and in the three one-day contests. Apart from obvious deficiencies in pace bowling, Pakistan 's batting, too, is a bit suspect and the Australians are much better fielders than their hosts are.
No matter what the results of the Test and one-day matches, the two sides must ensure that the ugly Rana -Gatting episode is not repeated. So far, skipper Border has been saying the right things about umpiring. On our part, we have to prove it to our guests from the Down Undes that cricket umpires in Pakistan are not compulsive cheats who always side with their own teams. Mercifully, Mr. Rana will not be standing in the Test series and equally mercifully, Allan Border is temperamentally totally different from Mike Gatting , the former being a far more commanding and composed leader of men than the latter.
Top-level cricket has become so bitter in recent years that no Test series is over without one side or the other, generally the touring one, complaining of having been short-changed. Imran Khan and other top cricketers around the world have been repeatedly proposing neutral umpires, but one wonders whether that will solve the problem. Honest, rather than neutral umpiring is the answer but then even an honest umpire, since he is human, is liable to err. Men like Frank Chester (of England ), who are honest and competent, come only once in a lifetime. An honest umpire need not necessarily be competent and a competent umpire may not always be honest.
One more thing. We always talk of honest umpiring but we seldom talk about if about honest players. More often than not, a batsman knows when he is out, but sadly, walking is more the exception than the rule these days.
Men like Majid Khan , Colin Cowdrey used to walk the moment they thought they were out. They did not give the bowler a chance to appeal. And even when they thought that they had been unjustly given out, they accepted the umpire's decision without throwing their bats about, without smashing the stumps and without getting into an argument with the opposing side or with the man who had ruled against them.
Even today, there are players across the world who walk and who don't contest the umpire's decision but they are a rapidly vanishing breed today. When a bowler is no-balled, he grumbles, when a batsman is out caught behind or off bat and pad, he stands his ground. And the leg-before decision is the most bitterly contested.
I propose an experiment in honesty for the coming series against Australia . Let the bowler and the fielding side appeal only after a batsman refuses to walk. Even then, the wicketkeeper or the fielder who thinks he has taken a fair catch should make the appeal and by the bowler alone if he thinks that he has the batsman out leg-before. Let Pakistan be the first to do this and Australia, I am sure, will respond.
The practice these days is that the entire team appeals in sky-rending chorus. One doesn't know how in the devil's name can a fielder posted at the third-man boundary or at long-leg can appeal for a leg-before or a caught behind or a bat and pad decision.
Come to think of it, you can't with justice appeal for leg-before even if you are fielding fairly close to the hot on the off or on-side. You have to be right behind the bowler's arm to judge whether a ball would have hit the stumps had the batsman not taken it on his pads. The idea appears to be: The noisier your appeal, the better chance it has of being accepted.
It would be marvellous if the series were to set new a trend in behaviour on the field. But why call it new? It was, after all, in vogue before cricket went commercial and gentlemen became players and yesterday's poorly paid players became the much better off professionals today. (The comparison is only with the players of old and not with professionals in other fields. For instance, compared with soccer or tennis professionals, cricketers are beggars).
Anyhow, cricket was an altogether lovelier game when it was an amateur sport. We can't return to the romantic age of cricket; but surely, you can't complain if one is nostalgic once in a while?
P.S: The 1963 Press and Publications Ordinance has been repealed. Good news, but in the case of the present writer, 25 years too late.
August 9, 1988
